About this app
What is Jingle Jingle?
Over 100 officers participated in the operation. Authorities seized several high-value vehicles, froze numerous bank accounts and imposed an asset restraint order valued at around €82 million. An arrest warrant was also executed.
Prosecutors allege that five suspects had operated internet-based gambling services without the required German licences from at least July 2021. The volume of bets placed on these platforms reportedly exceeded €5.8 billion between mid-2021 and the end of 2023.
In addition to illegal gambling, investigators suspect extensive tax evasion, with a projected tax shortfall of about €77.6 million for 2024.
What is Jingle Jingle?
This requirement raised concerns among operators worried that the barriers to entry could have become more restrictive, But at a meeting on the policies last year the regulator assured licensees it was not enforcing a specific strict rule on this.
Speaking to iGB at the time, Bjorn Fuchs, chairman of VNLOK Fuchs noted “there was a sigh of relief going through the room when it was presented”.
Rather than a crackdown across the board, what emerged was a more regulated renewal framework.
About Jingle Jingle
The age proposal was the bill’s most contentious provision. Opposition MPs argued during the committee stage that Botswana should retain the existing minimum age of 21, but the bill passed with Clause 2 intact. The clause would replace references in the Act to “the age of 21” with “the age of 18”.
Botswana’s parliament published the measure as the Gambling (Amendment) Bill, 2026, Bill No. 15 of 2026.
Botswana’s existing gambling framework sets the legal gambling age at 21. The amendment bill would align that threshold with the country’s general age of majority, which is 18.
